On the Elusive Search for Motivation Gains in Groups: Insights from the Collective Effort Model

Abstract

Summary: Although motivation losses in groups have been fairly easy to document and replicate, the search for motivation gains in groups has been far more elusive. Recently, we developed and tested various aspects of the Collective Effort Model (CEM; Karau & Williams, 1993 ) that we believe successfully accounts for prior research on social loafing and provides many useful clues as to conditions that may produce motivation gains in groups. In this article, we provide an overview of the CEM, illustrate its usefulness in guiding and understanding social compensation research, explain how it accounts for other motivation gains established in the literature, and highlight its implications for uncovering additional situations that may be conducive to motivation gains in groups.